


MiKEA

by startingatmidnight



Category: Lucifer (TV)
Genre: Copious Dogma (1999) References, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Enemies to Lovers, F/M, Fuckruary 2021, Humor, IKEA, if god is real i am going to hell for MiKEA, what if we kissed 🙈🙈 in the flat pack table aisle 🙊🙊
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-04
Updated: 2021-03-02
Packaged: 2021-03-16 02:55:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,214
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29200212
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/startingatmidnight/pseuds/startingatmidnight
Summary: For defying God's orders, Michael is grounded to Earth.For endangering God's creatures, Michael is stripped of his powers.Michael has no idea what he's done to deserve IKEA.
Relationships: Chloe Decker/Lucifer Morningstar, Ella Lopez/Michael
Comments: 49
Kudos: 74





	1. I am the Lord thy God

On Drew’s second day back from annual leave, the Archangel Michael appears to them.

In the Burbank IKEA parking lot. Which feels like kind of a cop-out, as divine experiences go. Also, not that anyone _asked_ , but they’re a wiccan, so they weren’t exactly looking for a sign.

The Archangel Michael flew down wearing a turtleneck and a sports coat. The Archangel Michael flew down on giant black wings that, individually, are larger than Drew’s Subaru. 

Drew’s a little busy flattening themselves _against_ said Subaru to comment, but this is all way too ‘Dogma’ to be taken seriously. Is Alanis Morissette God, too? _Wait, Alanis Morrisette might be God. Okay, don’t blaspheme. All hail Alanis Morrisette, amen. Oh fuck, do I have to stop lighting spell candles too? I just bought replacements, those were twenty dollars each! Couldn’t Alanis Morissette have given me a sign of divinity before I went on Etsy?_

The Archangel Michael narrows his eyes. “Are you _listening_?”

“Uh-huh. Yup, yeah, uh-huh. Totally listening. I just… I don’t get… in the _IKEA_?”

Michael’s wings shiver a little in the night sky. The Archangel’s eyes are wide and sinister. 

“Do you dare question God’s plan?” 

The Archangel takes a step forward. Now the angel is in motion, closer, Drew can see a few things they couldn’t before. There is a scar running down Michael’s face, diagonal, raising from left to right over the bridge of his nose and into his forehead. The angel doesn’t walk with ease. He’s limping, just slightly, shoulder slanted, one arm held close to his body. When Drew looks back to Michael’s face, it’s clear their observation hasn’t gone unnoticed. Michael’s eyes narrow, his head tilting.

“Do you dare,” Michael says, stepping closer still, “Question _me_?”

“Nope!” Drew replies. That has to go in the books for the stupidest possible way of responding. It’s not their fault: they do their customer service voice under stress. “Not at all. Yeah. You go right ahead.” 

They dig in their pocket and toss Michael the keys. Michael catches them one-handed, never taking his eyes off of Drew’s. 

“Remember,” Michael says, his voice darkening, “Not a word to anyone you know.”

Michael turns away, and Drew, who’s never been known for a good sense of self-preservation, calls after him.

“Wait!”

Michael turns. By the twist of his mouth, the raising of his eyebrow, he clearly thinks of Drew’s demand as something amusing and pathetic.

Drew clears their throat awkwardly. “Do I have to stop being a wiccan?”

Michael blinks.

“A _what?_ ”

This is how the Archangel Michael comes to be in the Burbank IKEA.

* * *

It’s not that Drew’s not flattered to be part of a “divine mission” and all. Kind of. Not really, they're actually _terrified_ , but they just don’t understand why it involves. Well. IKEA.

Specifically the _Burbank IKEA_. Other places exist in the world. Biblical places. Christian places. Churches and stuff. The Burbank IKEA has two things going for it: it’s the largest IKEA in the States, and the parking lot has a statue that looks like a penis. Neither of those things have ever _really_ screamed ‘divine mission’ to Drew, but far be it from them to question God’s plan. Amen and all that. Holy shit, they're going to have another breakdown if they keep thinking about it. _Stop_ thinking about it.

Drew’s Etsy spell candles are in their parcel locker when they get back to their apartment building, several nervous breakdowns and a crying jag in an In-N-Out later. They tweet out a cancellation of tonight’s stream, because if they try to talk to Twitch chat tonight they’re going to snap and go full street preacher, and then they unpack their spell candles on their bed. There’s a friendly note with a smiley face packed in with them. They stare down at the loosely penned smiley face. 

God is real. Angels are real.

One of them just moved into the Burbank IKEA.

A knock on the door.

“Hey, Drew. You alright?”

“Fine,” Drew says, forcing themselves to sound upbeat and casual. “All good. Long day at work, y’know.”

“Okay,” John says, uncertain, retreating from the door. There’s no way John bought that, but fuck John. For all the money he makes drawing furries, he could at _least_ do his own dishes once a month. If Drew wants to spend the night having a crisis of religion, it’s none of their roommates’ goddamn business.

Drew sniffles and stares down at the candles again. The smell of soy wax is usually comforting, but today they want to throw them out the window. What the hell does it matter if they lit one? Michael didn’t even know what Wicca _was_. Drew isn't a full-bore Pagan, but they enjoyed the ritualism and they liked to think there was truth to the spiritual practise. Turns out the Christians were right all along.

In all honesty, they’re almost more disappointed than upset. The _Christians_ were right? _Their aunt in Tampa with the unironic Jesus bobblehead is right?_ It’s almost… strike them down, Alanis Morrissette, but it’s such a _lame_ answer to life, the universe and everything. Some woman ate an apple and now Drew has to work two jobs to pay rent? The _fuck_?

And now the Archangel Michael is hiding out in the Burbank IKEA, and Drew has to not only keep _that_ quiet but “fulfil a divine mission”. Drew has no idea what Michael’s plan is to not get spotted by security and the cleaning crew. Mysterious ways, they guess. 

Fuck, they have to go to _work_ tomorrow.

Christianity fucking sucks.

There’s a vague clatter by the door. Drew gets off the bed and strides to the doorway, intending to give Anika hell if she’s trying to redecorate at night again, because it is _not_ happening tonight. They’ve had enough.

Drew flings the door open. There’s a bowl of vegan chili on the floor. A torn post-it note with John’s handwriting.

_Feel better soon :)_

Drew picks up the vegan chili. It smells really good. They retreat into their room and sit on the floor. It _is_ really good. There’s no way John’s going to do the dishes he just made by making it, but honestly, fuck it. Fuck the dishes. They can stay there until the very real Second Coming, Drew doesn’t care anymore.

There’s a kind of weird, rebellious victory in the fact that the chili was made by an atheist who makes furry fetish art for a living. _Take that,_ Drew thinks up to God. _Love thy neighbour, that’s one of your things, you’ll just have to put another tally mark on John’s file. Asshole. Your son’s a dick, by the way._

Drew blinks down at the chili. Maybe they shouldn’t call God an asshole. That might be one of the commandments, now they think about it. They probably also shouldn’t call an archangel a dick.

Even if he absolutely, unquestionably was. Drew thought angels were supposed to be _nice_.

Drew’s already had In-N-Out tonight, but that’s not real food anyway. They inhale the rest of the chili in record time. They resign themselves to the only two available options. Either they’ve gone crazy— a definite possibility— or an archangel is now staying in their workplace. Which is, in of itself, crazy. Either way, they have exactly two options.

One: help Michael hide in the IKEA, like he tasked them to do. Divinely. Option One will probably get them in God's good books, and then they can go to Heaven, with their aunt in Tampa and her Jesus bobblehead. 

Two: not do that. Drew could just... _not_ do that. And go to Hell, which they were probably already going to anyway, along with everyone they know, except probably Ella. There would be a cosmic consequence, obviously, they get that, _God,_ and they’re not… they’re just _thinking_ about it. Option Two. They’re allowed to _think_ about doing evil. 

They _think_ so, anyway. 

Drew puts the empty bowl down and, after a moment’s hesitation, picks up a spell candle from the pile on the bed. 

There's work to be done.


	2. Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain

Because of course, God doesn’t concern Himself with His children until there’s something to punish.

“Father,” Michael tries again, folding his wings away, “Samael has time and again proven that he only carries out his sentence when he _feels like it_. My intent had only been—”

“—Oh?” God tilts His head infinitesimally. “What _had_ your intention been, my son, when you captured my miracle and held her hostage? What had your intention been when you threatened harm to my first and only grandchild?”

“I have done nothing, _nothing_ at all, to physically hurt them. Samael has harmed these mortals _infinitely_ more than—”

God’s voice is gentle. “Don’t raise your voice, son.”

Something of the hypocrisy of this is starting to pound at a tempo with Michael’s heart, pulsing with the pain of his back, his arm, his wing. Why is he being punished? Why is _he_ the one at fault? Can’t He _see_? 

“He slaughters his _brother_ , kills a _human_ —”

Samael flinches.

God shakes His head. “Lower your voice, Michael.”

Fury bubbles over. Millennia of doing exactly what he’s told, millennia of watching Samael live his life indiscriminately without so much as a word from his father, and the moment that Michael does anything to show up the favoured twin for who he really is, God comes down and says that _he’s_ at fault? How is this fair? _How is this fair?_

“ _No!_ You need to _listen to—_ ” 

Michael’s vocal cords stiffen and fail. He coughs empty air from his throat. He recognises, far too late, the last time someone said ‘no’ to his Father. What it amounts to. What it could count as. 

God looks mildly disappointed, as if Michael’s technical rebellion had been displeasing rainfall on a pleasant day.

“So many words for me, Michael, and not an honest one among them. I want you to tell me the truth. Why did you come to Los Angeles?”

Michael swallows as his vocal cords return to his command.

“To prove what I’ve already proven. _‘Lucifer’_ has no interest in following the terms of the punishment that _you_ laid down for—”

“No.”

Michael blinks. “No?”

God shakes His head. “That is another lie, Michael.”

Michael blinks again. He shakes his head, confused. 

“No, it’s not.”

“Michael, tell me the truth.”

“Father, I left the Silver City to ensure that your will was carried out on Samael as you had—”

“Michael.” God’s eyes glitter in the unmoving sunlight. “This is your last chance.”

Michael laughs: it’s the only thing he can do. He’s somewhere between incredulous and afraid. “Father, I’m not lying to you.”

God sighs. He looks from Michael, to Amenadiel, to Samael. Samael has been entirely silent since God arrived. Samael does not speak now. 

“I had hoped to avoid this,” God says. His eyes do not stray from Samael’s. “I take no pleasure in it.”

Samael takes a wordless step back, mouth opening: before he can say so much as a syllable, God’s eyes return to Michael.

“Michael,” God says. “You have threatened my creations. You have wrought chaos, in the Silver City and on Earth. You continue to lie to me.”

Michael looks to Samael, in his fear: he’s not looking for his twin to come to his defence. He wouldn’t expect it. He’s drawn to look at Samael in the same way someone might look at a car wreck before they themselves crash and burn.

Samael looks back in silence. His eyes are wide and fearful. Michael wonders if the fear is because he believes himself to be next for punishment, or because he knows what Michael’s punishment will feel like.

“Father,” Michael attempts, voice hoarse, fear and pain lancing through his spine, “I _promise_ you—”

“You will remain in Los Angeles for as long as I will it. I have stripped you of your immortality. I have stripped you of your abilities. I permit you your wings, in my mercy.”

 _Mercy_ , Michael thinks, cold fear washing over him. _A greater mercy would be to cut them off._

“Lucifer,” God says, and his useless twin finally finds his voice.

“Father—”

“For as long as Michael remains on Earth, you are to ensure he does not come to harm. Michael: you may return when you give me a truthful answer.”

God rolls His head around on His shoulders, as if readying for some great effort. 

“Don’t do it again,” He tells Amenadiel, smiling with something approaching fatherly regard.

With that, the precinct explodes with sound and glass.

Time restarts in the universe, but Michael still feels as if he’s stuck. He inhales, and the feeling of air in his lungs… it feels _necessary_. As if he’d die without it. He inhales again, and then again.

Amenadiel and Samael exchange glances.

“Unbelievable,” Samael says to Michael, faint but triumphant. “I never thought I’d see the day that you’d get the punishment you so _richly—_ ”

“ _—Lucifer_?!”

Samael looks around to the source of the sound, coming from inside another room. It’s Chloe Decker, without question. Samael glances anxiously between his brothers and the sound of the bleating human, shifting from foot to foot.

“Amenadiel,” he says, “Do not let him out of your _sight_.”

With that, he takes off in the direction of his precious detective. Michael turns to Amenadiel. Something’s shaken loose in his skull, leaving him blank and empty, and when he looks to his older brother he is, for the first time in thousands of years, waiting for a command. Something he can follow, in the wake of the loss of everything he is.

Instead, a baby cries out over the din of the panicking humans: Amenadiel follows the clarion call with his entire body, turning entirely around. He turns back to Michael, pointing vaguely in his direction, eyes still cast towards the sound.

“ _Don’t go anywhere_ ,” Amenadiel orders, already walking away towards his human paramour and mortal offspring.

Michael blinks. 

He has been banished from the Silver City. He has been unmade by his father. He has been abandoned by his brothers. Humans rush past him, knock into him in their rush to go upstairs, go downstairs, carry out their little lives. Nobody pays him any heed. 

Even right now, with his shoulder screaming in pain, with his head empty and floating, he’s aware that this borders on insanity: but he’s _jealous_. 

Samael’s fall was the culmination of a war: entire galaxies unmade and reformed into weapons as the Demiurge had fought itself to the bitter end. Samael’s banishment came at the hand of God’s wrath and at the point of Michael’s sword. He had burned a scar into the background radiation of the universe as he’d screamed his way down to Hell. 

Michael’s punishment has come as the consequence of a petty argument and an afternoon of keeping a human hostage in a zoo. Michael has been left without his abilities, his being, his personhood as Demiurge. Michael has been banished not to hell but to Los Angeles. And the moment God’s will was done, his family abandoned him to go tend to their pets.

Something fizzles out in Michael’s head.

He follows the crowd until he finds an exit, dragging his hair from his forehead, cold sweat running down the twist of his scar. He walks away from the humans until he finds an empty alleyway with enough room to unfurl his wings. After the fight, it is the worst sort of searing pain to take flight, but he cannot stay. He has lived under his father’s command without complaint for billions of years, but he cannot and will not live under the authority of his unworthy, undeserving, unpunished twin. Michael would rather that God had struck him down to Hell.

Taking flight is slow. In fact, it is so excruciatingly slow that for a moment Michael does not realise he has lifted off the ground at all. His wings are now only that: they lack for divinity. He cannot propel himself on the matter of the universe: he has to move as a bird would. He beats his wings harder, gritting his teeth against the pain, and rises as fast as he can. Condensation pearls and rolls down his feathers as he rises into the clouds, and then above them. It’s never been so exhausting to fly: he’s already panting with the effort by the time he’s risen high enough to observe Los Angeles. It takes him longer than it should to realise, with his new mortal biology, a lack of oxygen can affect him: he goes lower and gulps in air, making for the glittering coastline. 

He would curse this, his state, his undoing, but who is there to curse? Only God, and Michael knows better than to do that. 

He flies with unease over the ocean as the sun sets. He isn’t sure where he’s going, only that he needs to put distance between himself and Samael. Hawaii isn’t a good idea; Samael’s enough of a hedonist to follow him there. If he found some unappealing tract of land in the Pacific, stayed there and stayed quiet, he might have enough time to make a plan. 

_Blat._

Michael muffles a yell into the barrier as he collides with it face-first. His wings flatten and scramble against the glassy invisible surface; he kicks off from it and flails, recovering height. He scrubs a hand over his face, staring at what looks like empty air, willing himself not to scream.

‘Stay in Los Angeles’ isn’t just an order. He is trapped in here with Samael. He cannot outrun his twin, nor outfly him, nor outfight him. 

He has to find a place to land and he has to do it _right now_.

The pain of staying aloft is starting to get unbearable, but Michael is beginning to entertain imagery of what Samael might do to him if he finds him. He’s never seen Hell, but he’s heard the stories. His twin brother invented the very notion of torturous punishment, and Michael has never feared that reputation until now. He is mortal. Samael's orders are to keep Michael from coming to harm, but Samael has never taken interest in their Father's orders if they do not suit him. If his twin brother trapped him, exacted revenge...

Michael fixes his wings and glides over Los Angeles, grimacing into the glare of a passenger jet as it passes by. He observes the human world beneath him.

The zoo is out of the question, and Samael knows him well enough to investigate other abandoned buildings. With his brothers’ police connections, breaking into a human’s home is out of the question: it would gain too much attention to take a human hostage just to hide in their home. Ditto for hotels. He needs somewhere that neither Amenadiel nor Samael would check, somewhere that his brothers’ human pets can’t track him to. Somewhere he can stay inconspicuous in a crowd.

This is what leads him to the Burbank IKEA. 

He walks it in the last half-hour of opening. The building is labyrinthine: it has enough resources to permit him to hide and maintain his mortal body. With the parking lot, it’s clearly designed for hundreds of humans. It is the sort of place that Samael would never touch: the sort of place Amenadiel would never think to check. It will permit him to go unseen. 

When the IKEA closes, Michael uses what little is left of him to ensure the employees’ silence. A frantic witch gives him a key. A terrified cleaning crew gives him the privacy he demands. He paces the dark and silent halls of IKEA until he can stand upright no longer. 

‘Find the mattress for you’, the wall tells Michael. ‘Sprung and pocket-sprung mattresses for even support.’

Michael has his pick of an endless row of empty beds, but something draws him to his right, tucked away behind a thin false wall. IKEA contains an array of these: strange facsimiles of the human home, staged as if for living in. Were it not for the plastic labels and the stark aluminium struts that make up the ceiling, it would almost look like it was intended for someone to stay within.

The ‘room’ that Michael selects is more contained than most. It has a false doorway. The ceiling lights are off, but the room is filled with working lights: a standing lamp in one corner, a string of bulbs hanging from a corkboard on a false wall. The nightstand has a plastic light that shifts hues: it is shaped like a deformed panda. 

There is a bed labelled ‘Balestrand’. The black and white stripes on the sheets shift and shimmer as the disfigured panda cheerfully changes from red to blue to purple to green. Michael lies on top of the covers. He stares at the warehouse ceiling. He tries shrugging his right shoulder, but the pain is too profound. It hasn’t been this bad in centuries.

He closes his eyes. He exhales, and then holds it. He feels it: the scream of his lungs. If he keeps holding his breath indefinitely, he’ll die. He is alone, mortal, and ungoverned. He is forsaken. 

And until he can find a way out of this, he’s trapped in IKEA.

Michael takes a breath. With his good arm, he bats at the deformed panda until its empty face turns dark.

Mortal sleep comes swift and uneasy.

* * *

Drew comes into work half an hour before opening. They have a night of emergency theology research under their belt, and they have a sheaf of printouts in their hand.

They pick up one of the little wooden pencils from the box in the entrance.

Their first task is locating Michael and finding out what damage he’s done, which isn’t difficult. The manager has shut and locked her door, and Drew can smell the candyfloss vape that she only employs when she’s having her semi-annual nervous breakdown. There are several emails with religious overtones from the night time cleaning crew, pledging never to set foot in Burbank IKEA again. The break room is entirely full.

Drew walks past it. They had their existential crisis last night: they’re not interested in reliving it. God is real, angels in the outfield, divine mission. Whatever. They know exactly which employee will be saying what. Callie is the world’s worst Catholic, but she _is_ a Catholic, and the rest of the team tends to follow her around like baby ducks. She’ll be shepherding the others through it, which means Drew can take point on the work that _needs_ to be done.

The Archangel Michael seems to be able to put his wings away when he wants, because when Drew finds him, he doesn’t have any. He’s wandering the kitchen department silently, inspecting it like he’s looking for something. In the artificial light, without his wings, Michael doesn’t seem as intimidating. His jacket is rumpled, like he slept in it. His hair is sticking in all directions. His limp is more prominent than it was last night, and he’s got his right arm practically glued to his side.

Drew still feels a thrill of fear sink into their spine. They’ve learnt from Google that questioning the plans of God is kind of a taboo, but they’re just not the type to obey unquestioningly. If that gets them condemned, so be it. They’d rather know for sure.

“Morning,” Drew starts. Michael doesn’t look around. In fact, Michael does an incredible job of pretending that nobody said anything. Michael continues to walk stiffly in a roving lap of the kitchen department, inspecting every aisle.

Drew clears their throat. “Hey, uh, Michael.”

Michael glances at Drew from the corner of his eye. “Leave me.”

Drew shifts from foot to foot. On the one hand, disobeying a direct command. On the other hand…

“Did you, uh, reveal yourself to the entire staff?”

Michael turns around, narrowing his eyes. “I’ve ordered you to leave, witch.”

 _Okay_. Strike one on Drew’s hit list: omniscience. Michael didn’t know what a wiccan was last night, and this morning he’s misremembering the entire word. Michael is fallible.

“Yeah, no, I get that, but we’re gonna be opening in like twenty minutes and I really can’t have you… _exposing_ yourself to the general public.”

Michael takes a step forward. Drew resists the urge to step back. Michael holds himself at a slight angle: his shoulders tilt. With the limp, the scar on his face, the way he holds his arm close like an injured bird: Drew can’t say yet for certain where the injuries are from, but angels can definitely take damage, and for whatever _mysterious_ reason, this one is hiding while badly injured. _Strike two_.

“Let’s make something clear,” Michael says. He steps forward again. His smile is hollow and dangerous. “ _You..._ don’t get to tell me what to do.”

Drew takes a deep breath. They do the exact thing that the Bible told them not to.

“Yeah? Why’s that?”

Michael’s laugh is sharp and nasal. Mocking. Another step forward. Drew isn’t exactly short, but Michael towers over them. 

“I’ve struck sinners down for _so_ much less than this,” Michael says. “You don’t question me. You don’t order _me_. I am the archangel Michael. I’ve lived as long as time itself. I am celestial. Immortal. Indestructible. I could send you to Hell where you stand. If you continue to defy your place in God’s divine mission—”

“About that,” Drew says. They’re emboldened by Michael’s continuing threat offensive. Everything about this seems _way_ off-book. “Why _exactly_ does this divine mission need to hide you in IKEA? We sell furniture here.”

Michael’s eye twitches. “It’s not your place to question God’s will.”

“Kind of is. I pray at an altar in the shape of a pentacle, it’s basically my whole deal. Speaking of, if you’re such an archangel, how come you don’t know what a wiccan is?”

Michael’s lip curls. “You’re a satanist.”

“Not even _close_ , oh my God.”

“Listen to me—”

“ _—You_ listen. You just traumatised the cleaning crew, sent my manager into a nervous breakdown like _four_ months ahead of schedule, and I think my colleagues might be starting a cult in the break room. All we’ve got to go on is your word that you’re the archangel Michael and _you’re hiding in an IKEA_ because you’re on 'God’s mission'. This whole thing is big time sketchy.” Drew narrows their eyes. “I think you’re an imposter.”

Michael blinks. “Excuse me?”

“Yeah,” Drew says, trying to suppress the shiver that runs through them. They hope they’ve gauged this right. “All I know is that you have big wings, you’re limping real bad, and you’re hiding in an IKEA in Burbank. As far as I know, you’re just some evil X Men mutant that got hit by a car. I don’t buy you’re some ‘celestial immortal’ that could send me to hell where I stand. Celestial immortals don’t hide in IKEA scaring cleaning crews. If you were _really_ above all this, you wouldn’t have had to scare me into giving you the keys.”

Michael’s eyes are sharp and dark, but Drew sees, for the first time, that the maybe-angel is shifting subtly from foot to foot. He looks from side to side before he speaks, like he’s making something up on the spot.

“This is your last chance to repent,” Michael warns. He puts a hand up like he’s about to smite Drew with his palm. “Pledge loyalty or I send you to Hell.”

“Uh huh,” Drew says. “Hail Satan.”

Drew jams the little IKEA pencil as far as they can into Michael’s palm.

* * *

As any of Drew’s colleagues can attest, Maybe-Michael picked the worst person to try to fear-of-God. 

Drew works two jobs. By the day, they do loss prevention at IKEA. By night, they run a Twitch stream. They speedrun Soulsborne games. Drew’s life is split in half by two occupations: handling the cesspool of an internet chat room, and stopping random teenagers from stealing pot plants. They’re very good at their job.

Even by itself, this is enough to make Drew Michael’s perfect enemy. Drew can spot a sketchy guy who’s going to try and live in an IKEA from thirty paces, and from having witnessed Twitch chat, they know God is dead.

When Drew stabbed Michael with the pencil, Drew gets the feeling that Maybe-Michael put some of that together. The fake archangel has been bitching and moaning laps around the IKEA for the past two hours, but surprise, surprise: no wings around the customers, and he’s not leaving. He’s avoiding the staff like the plague.

His colleagues have split into two camps. Half of them think that Michael is the real archangel and are absolutely convinced Drew just assaulted a messenger from God. Half of them think that Drew’s right, that the wings they saw earlier today are statistically more likely to be some weird freak of nature or mass hallucination, and that Michael should be ejected from the IKEA by any means necessary.

To Drew’s surprise, staff favourite and slutty devout Catholic Callie is nowhere to be seen. 

“Absolutely bounced, the second the wings came out,” a cashier on Drew’s side tells them. “She started repenting. Whole way from the showroom to the emergency exit, talking about Satan.”

“Huh,” Drew says. “Like. Normal repenting? Or like, Michael is actually the Devil or something repenting?”

“Yeah, because I’m gonna know.”

“Just asking.”

“He really told you this was a _divine mission_?”

“Sketchy, right?”

“I mean, I probably wouldn’t have stabbed him, but then I’m not Drew Raccoon.”

Here’s the other reason Michael picked a bad person to fear-of-God.

Two years ago, while it was closed for Christmas, the flat-pack department ended up with a raccoon problem. The IKEA ended up playing host to a couple dozen raccoons that broke into the meatballs and got fat and belligerent. The manager didn’t want to call pest control, because she didn’t want customers to know that the kids’ ball pit had played host to a raccoon orgy. 

Drew’s not the smartest person in the world, nor the best at looking before they leap, but they’re _damn good_ at getting things that shouldn’t be in an IKEA out of an IKEA. And, as all good speedrunners do, Drew had written copious and detailed step by step instructions, so that in the event of their death, the raccoons wouldn’t return for revenge.

The manager really _has_ gone full nervous breakdown, because she crawled out of her office window and left. Usually, that means she’s not going to be back for a week at least, so there won’t be any help from above. The born-again half of the staff have pledged loyalty to Michael and promised to keep his presence secret, so Drew can’t call the cops or they’re just going to hide the fake archangel from view. 

So: the only way to get Michael out of IKEA is to _antagonise him into leaving_.

Drew lays the sheaf of printouts on the break room coffee table. They regard their fellow rebels against God.

“Okay, everyone. So, uh. We have a raccoon problem.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The panda night light is a ‘SPÖKA’. There are many varieties. I think they’re supposed to be ghosts. Many of them look like pandas, if pandas were designed by a minimalist that hated pandas. I love them.


End file.
